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Her mind cowered there, exhausted When the man left, she forced herself to ascend The physical pain was staggering, and the sheets were soaked with her blood, but she was still intact in the most important way She still wore the Jewels She was still a witch

Within a month, she made her first kill

He was like all the others, taking her to a seedy roo her with a copper h the next day Her hatred for the men who used her, and Titian before her, turned to ice So when his thrusts becaer, when he arched his back and his chest rose above her, she called in the horn-handle dagger and stabbed him in the heart His life force pumped into her while his life’s blood spilled out

Using Craft, Surreal pushed his heavy body off hers This one wouldn’t hit her or refuse to pay It was exhilarating

For three years she roamed the streets, her child’s body and unusual looks a beacon to the most sordid But her skill with a knife was not unknown, and it becae in the streets that a wise man paid Surreal in advance

Three years Then one day as she was slipping down an alley she’d already probed to be sure it was eer in hand, she could only stare at Dae her Without thinking, she ran up the alley to get away from him, and hit a psychic shield that held her captive until his hand locked on her wrist He said nothing He si ridden one of those psychic Webs, Surreal clung to hi at a kitchen table in a furnished loft in another part of the Real her to eat, while Daemon watched her as he drank his wine

Too nervous to eat, Surreal threw the words at hiood one," Daemon replied calutter word she knew at hi, when she finally sputtered into silence

"I’ll be what I am"

"You’re a child of lass "Your mother’s people live--what--a hundred, two hundred years? You may see two thousand orscraps du in filthy roo what you do--for better rooms, better food, better pay You’d have to start as an apprentice, of course, but I know a place where they’d take you and train you well"

Dae out a list When he was done, he pushed it in front of Surreal "A wo in a chair instead of lying on her back A sound advantage, I should think"

Surreal stared at the list, uneasy There were the expected subjects--literature, languages, history--and then, at the bottoe, a list of skills more suited to the knife than to paid sex

As Tersa cleared the table, Daemon rose fro her back, his war her pointed ear "Subtlety, Surreal," he whispered "Subtlety is a great weapon There are other ways to slit a man’s throat than to wash the walls with his blood If you continue down that road, they’ll find you, sooner or later There are so many ways for aviciousness in the sound "Some men die for lack of lovesome die because of it Think about it"

Surreal went to the Red Moon house The ht her the bedroom arts The rest she learned quietly on her own Within ten years, she was the highest-paid whore in the house--and ain for her other skills as well

She traveled throughout Terreille, offering her skills to the best Red Moon house in whatever city she was in and carefully accepting contracts for her other profession, the one she found --and more pleasurable She carried a set of keys to town houses, suites, lofts--some in the most expensive parts of town, others in quiet, backwater streets where people asked no questions Soave her whatever care she could

And so a place with Sadi when he slipped away fro Those were good tie was expansive when he felt like talking, and when she chattered, his golden eyes always held the controlled amusement of an older brother

For almost three hundred years they caht when, already a little drunk, she consu him read a book He was comfortably slouched in a chair, shirt half unbuttoned, bare feet on a hassock, his black hair uncharacteristically tousled

"I ondering," Surreal said, giving him a tipsy smile

Daean to tweak the corners of his ?"

"Professional curiosity, you understand They talk about you in the Red Moon houses, you know"